A London tribunal has blocked an audacious move by a prominent Nigerian lawyer, Prof. Mike Ozekhome to take ownership of a house in North London.
The judgement, delivered on 11 September by Judge Ewan Paton of the First-tier Tribunal (Property Chamber), brings to an end nearly four years of extraordinary courtroom drama, marked by allegations of forgery, impersonation, phantom identities, and conflicting testimonies.
In August 2021, Ozekhome, who is a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, applied to transfer the property at 79 Randall Avenue, Neasden, into his name. He claimed that it was a gift from a man who presented himself as Mr. Tali Shani, said to be the property’s owner, in appreciation for legal services.
But the application was challenged in September 2022 by Westfields Solicitors, claiming to represent “Ms. Tali Shani”, who insisted she was the registered owner of the property since 1993. She claimed that she had never signed any transfer, and was “outraged” by Ozekhome’s application.
At the heart of the storm was a former Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Lt. General Jeremiah Useni (rtd.). Useni, a former powerful Nigerian military officer, died in France last 23 January.
In its verdict, the tribunal held that the case was built on a network of fraud, impersonation, and forged documents, but concluded that Useni was the genuine purchaser of the property back in 1993, even though he did it with a fictitious name.
In his application, Ozekhome relied on Mr. Tali Shani, said to have owned the UK property since 1993.
The man produced a Nigerian passport, claimed to have bought the property at age 20 with money from family cattle businesses, and later transferred it to Ozekhome out of gratitude for legal services.
In contrast, Ms. Shani insisted she bought the house in her “hey days” and accused Ozekhome of trying to seize it using impostors.
Ms. Shani never appeared before the tribunal, despite multiple adjournments. In 2024, her lawyers filed medical letters claiming she was too ill to testify, and eventually reported that she had died in October 2024, attaching a death certificate from Nigeria.
Investigations later revealed that documents submitted by both sides — including identity cards, utility bills, and a National Identification Number — were forged.
The tribunal ruled that neither Ozekhome nor the supposed woman named Ms. Shani was the true owner of the property.
The court rejected testimonies from supposed relatives of Ms. Shani. One witness, Ayodele Damola, had introduced himself as her biological son, while Anakwe Obasi introduced himself as her cousin.
Both appeared in court with documents, but the judge described their evidence as riddled with contradictions and lacking the most basic proof of identity.
The judge said that neither witness could present a single family photograph, proof of her residence in Jos, or verifiable links to Useni, whose name surfaced repeatedly in their stories.
Obasi told the court that his “cousin”, Ms. Shani, had a long relationship with Useni and that she once gave him money in the early 1990s to buy a London property on her behalf. He admitted, however, that he had never taken a photograph with his cousin, the General, or Damola. When pressed, he said he was ‘not a photogenic person’.
The witness further alleged that an official photographer had captured Ms. Shani’s funeral, but the photographer was ‘killed by a bandit two days later’.
Meanwhile, in Damola’s affidavit, he claimed that Ms. Shani died in a road accident along the Jos-Abuja expressway, while Obasi said she was terminally ill and died in a Lagos hospital.
Damola also testified that Ms. Shani purchased the London property in 1993 and later rented it out through Useni. Damola also alleged that the transfer of the property to Ozekhome was repayment for a N54 million loan to the General during an election campaign.
A death certificate claimed Ms. Shani died in hospital, but an affidavit filed in Abuja placed her death in a car crash on 3 October 2023. An obituary notice advertised a thanksgiving service on “Sunday, 30 November 2024” — a date that did not exist, since 30 November fell on a Saturday that year.
Expert witnesses from Nigerian institutions discredited the documents presented to prove Ms. Shani’s existence.
The Head of Legal Services at the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC), Mr. Festus Esangbedo testified that the National Identification Number (NIN) slip tendered in her name was ‘fake, fraudulent and not authorised’.
His investigation found that, although a NIN was issued on 23 June 2024, it was generated using loopholes meant for amputees to bypass fingerprinting, and the picture attached to the NIN has some distinct irregularities and does not comply with the International Civil Aviation Organisation’s standards. The registration was even carried out remotely from Monaco — a clear violation of procedure, Esangbedo told the court.
Police officer Ibrahim Sini of the Force Intelligence Department traced a mobile bill allegedly belonging to Ms. Shani back to its real source, confirming another layer of fraud.
In his ruling, the judge dismissed the testimonies of Damola and Obasi as fabrications.
He declared: ‘I do not accept that “she” was ever a real living person. I do not accept that “she” therefore died, whether in hospital or in a mysterious car accident. I certainly do not accept that “she” purchased this property in London in 1993. Nor do I accept that Ayodele Damola is “her” son, or that Anukwe Obasi is “her’ cousin”‘.
Concluding that the entire case was built on ‘forgery and deception’, the tribunal struck out the claims, describing them as an abuse of judicial process.
‘The case has been pursued by others in the name of a person who never existed’, the judge ruled.
Ozekhome told the court that the London property was transferred to him in 2021 by a Mr. Shani, whom he claimed was the true owner. According to him, although Useni had registered the house under the name of “Ms. Tali Shani”, it was actually purchased and held by Mr. Shani since 1993.
He admitted, however, that he never knew Mr. Shani until January 2019, more than two decades after the disputed purchase, and had no personal knowledge of how the property was acquired or managed in earlier years.
His confidence in the claim, he explained, stemmed largely from his long-standing relationship with Useni, whom he described as both a client and friend for over 20 years.
The Nigerian lawyer told the tribunal that after being introduced to Mr. Shani in 2019, he undertook several legal services for him — ranging from advisory work to court appearances — and that the property was later gifted to him in 2021 as an expression of gratitude.
He described Mr. Shani as a wealthy farmer and businessman, engaged in cattle, groundnuts, mangoes, and real estate, and that he came to see him as a father figure.
Ozekhome declined to provide evidence of the alleged legal work, citing client confidentiality. He also denied paying the £500,000 mentioned in Mr. Shani’s earlier statements, insisting that the transfer was entirely gratuitous and that the value of his professional services exceeded any monetary consideration.
However, the tribunal rejected Ozekhome’s account. ‘Tali Shani… did not purchase this property himself in 1993, and so had no title of his own to pass to the respondent’, the judge said.
The court also found that Ozekhome’s defence, supported by his son, amounted to a ‘contrived story… invented in an attempt to provide a plausible reason’ for the 2021 transfer.
The tribunal therefore concluded that Mr. Shani had no connection whatsoever to the 1993 purchase, and that the story advanced by Ozekhome could not stand.
Judge Paton ruled that the house was secretly bought in 1993 by Useni, using a false identity.
Useni was a very influential member of the General Sani Abacha military regime, and was even in contention to be Head of State following Abacha’s death in June 1998.
The tribunal examined conflicting testimonies, including evidence from Nigerian police and identity authorities, as well as oral testimony from Useni himself.
Useni appeared before the court through a video link in 2024. Contrary to Ozekhome’s defence, Useni told the court plainly: ‘I owned it. I bought the property. It is my property’.
He admitted registering the house in another person’s name but denied ever knowing a ‘Ms. Tali Shani’.
Documents before the tribunal confirmed that the 1993 purchase was made under the false name — Philips Bincan — and that Useni had a pattern of using false or ‘coded’ names, such as “Tim Shani”, for bank accounts and companies — a practice already established by the Royal Court of Jersey in 2022.
The court held that the similarity of names and timing strongly supported the finding that Useni deliberately used the false name, “Tali Shani” to register the property.
The tribunal found Useni’s evidence consistent with purchase records, unlike the shifting accounts of the Shanis or Ozekhome. The court also ruled that since ‘Mr. Tali Shani’ had no legal title to transfer the London property to Ozekhome, the chief land registrar must cancel Ozekhome’s application to be registered as proprietor.
The court also held that since Useni is deceased, ownership now rests with whoever obtains probate of his English assets.
‘General Useni is now deceased, so, on my findings, his title and interest in this property would vest in such persons as obtained a grant of probate or administration in respect of his English assets. Although not strictly bound by my findings (since they were not parties to the case), it is a matter for any such persons, on their own advice, what, if any, steps they take in this regard’, the judge ruled.